ISLAMABAD - Though the opposition is set to create rumpus in the upcoming joint session of Parliament, which is mainly summoned for Financial Action Task Force (FATF) related legislation, the PTI government is set to smoothly ensure approval of the bills with a majority of votes.
The PTI’s government had previously managed to approve two FATF related bills from the Senate, despite a lack of majority. This tacit cooperation from the opposition factions has boosted the confidence of the ruling party to pass the rest of the seven bills during the legislation-specific joint sitting.
The government with the support of its coalition partners has planned to completely ignore the anti-government sloganeering and noisy protest during the important legislative business. It was conveyed to all aggressive and firebrand lawmakers from the treasury benches that they should avoid locking horns with the opposition till the completion of the legislative business.
As the current National Assembly has witnessed a novel trend, in which the government members are comparatively more aggressive and provocative compared to the opposition legislators, the scenes of verbal and physical brawls between treasury and opposition, in the last two years, are witnessed almost thrice of week.
Both major opposition parties [PML-N and PPP-P] have also stopped asking the government to ‘act as the government and not behave like opposition’.
“Immature and non-serious attitude of government members has become a new fashion in the Parliament,” PML-N’s MNA Murtaza Javed Abbasi shared with this newspaper.
Former Deputy Speaker National Assembly hinted at creating a noisy protest in the upcoming joint sitting.
“We have a lot of concerns over the FATF related bills. It was important to summon Kashmir related sessions but the government has its own plans,” said the PML-N MNA. Another member from opposition believed that the government has no plan to conduct parliamentary affairs with the consultation of opposition benches.
Whereas, the incumbent government has seemingly no plans to change its ‘aggressive tone’ against the opposition benches. Political experts claim the present government would not give a chance to the opposition parties to grill the treasury benches.
They were of the view that the government might make legislation on all matters through a joint sitting of the Parliament in future.
The government side is also taking advantage of the recent clash between MMA and main opposition parties [PML-N and PPP-P].
The JUI-F has expressed reservations with the PML-N and the PPP-P for allowing the government to easily pass FATF related bills in the Senate, despite a lack of majority in the house.
The government, despite coronavirus [COVID-19], has recently finished the longest session of the term but it could not develop consensus on important bills.
